Title: Any Other Name
Author: Zappy Zaps
Category: AU Drama/Action/Adventure
Summary: Neh….
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: All the Star Trek characters are Paramount's. I don't own them (yet). ;)
Archiving: Please do, but tell me! zappyzaps@hotmail.com
Author's note: The conclusion to what happened during the escape. And now back to my favourite genre! Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe!! Mwa-ha ha ha haaa!! (
May 02
Part 4
Carefully he wove through the corridors of the ship. A small light on the screen in his visor blinked green indicating that the woman had placed his gadget in the right place and it was active. He knew all the crewmembers were in the cargo bays. He had hacked his way into Voyager's computer from Mercury and had made and internal sensor sweep. Only the woman he had helped had been out of the cargo bays.
He was heading to the bridge now. From there he could control just about anything. He had contemplated going to main engineering but after seeing the lay out he had determined that there were too many points of entry for him to block off before reinforcements came so he chose the bridge instead.
While he was in the turbolift he contacted Mercury and instructed the computer to upload the virus he created. Another green light flashed indicating that the deed had been done.
On the bridge of Voyager the Kazon looked over the systems in the ship and ran diagnostics as they familiarized themselves with Voyager's systems. Maj Cullah and Jabin were in the Captain's Ready Room discussing the fate of their prisoners when for no apparent reason the lights went out. Jabin and Cullah immediately went for the exit but found they were all locked down.
On the bridge the other Kazon were confused. The only lighting was provided by the buttons on the consoles. As they stumbled around blindly they were unaware of the extra being on the bridge who was taking them out one by one, silently.
With the night vision on his visor he could easily see the Kazon forms as the moved in the darkness. With expert ease and efficiency he took down each one, sometimes using as little as a Vulcan neck pinch.
A minute later the lights came back on as Voyager's computer system corrected the error and functions were returned to normal, almost. The bridge remained locked down and only Tom could unlock them. The minute of darkness had been more than enough for him to gain control of the bridge. Moving to the operations console he transported the unconscious Kazon officers to the brig and erected a force-field to keep them there.
He had to get the Kazon off of Voyager or at least in a place where they can be easily managed. The brig wouldn't be able to hold all of them. If he beamed them outside to the planet they'd inform the others that something was occurring on Voyager and would bring back up.
Tom settled for relocating as many as he could to the brig and transporting the rest of them to the mess hall. It wasn't the most secure of locations but hopefully it would hold them long enough for the Starfleet officers to be reorganized and able to contain the Kazon.
Due to some damages the capacity of the transporters was limited and he could only transport eight people at a time using each transporter system. The Kazon that were still on the loose were a hazard but Tom doubted they would be able to hamper his plans too much. His main concern had been that they would go after the Voyager crew that was locked in the cargo bays.
The device he had given the woman to place on the door controls had locked down all entrances and exited to the cargo bays and erected force- fields to repel weapons fire should any Kazon try to go after the crew.
A few minutes later all transports had been completed. Tom sent an encrypted command to the device at the cargo bay and it ceased functioning, unlocking the doors and terminating the force-field.
In the cargo bay the crew was lost in the dark bumping into each other and any other object in the large rooms. At the entrances crewmembers worked to try an open the doors. Jennifer Delaney had told them everything she knew about the stranger but nobody knew his identity.
The lights came on again and they all wondered what was going on. Torres and Kim continued their work on opening the door along with Carey but they hadn't made any progress. Unexpectedly, the doors slid open allowing them to exit the room. Captain Janeway looked at the three people who had been working on opening the door.
"Good work," she commended them. Torres, Kim and Carey looked at one another in confusion.
"We didn't do anything," Carey said.
They all came to the conclusion that it was their mysterious stranger who had released them. Each person exited the cargo bay heading to their respective positions. They were going to assume that there were still armed Kazon on board. Torres and Carey went to main engineering while Kim, Chakotay, Tuvok, Janeway and a few other bridge officers went to the bridge.
They arrived on the bridge and saw the man matching Ensign Delaney's description standing as he tapped some commands into the helm console. He wore a dark grey suit with pockets in many places and the knees and elbows of the suit had extra padding on it. The material looked fairly thick but did not hamper his movement t at all. He also had on gloves. The palms had a thin material to protect his hands but not reduce his sense of touch while the backside of the gloves were thicker.
Knowing that Janeway and her crew would come to the bridge Tom had unlocked the exit before their arrival. When he finished entering the string of commands he turned to face the newcomers.
He looked at each of them and they scrutinized him as well. His gaze rested on the Captain. "Captain Janeway, I presume."
"Yes. And you are?"
"Tom," was the simple reply. "Approximately sixty-five Kazon are locked in the mess hall and the brig. Security team should be sent to each location. If any doors or systems are locked down the words 'Gamma phi' will open them up."
"Tuvok," Janeway looked at her friend and he nodded to her unspoken order and headed for the trubolift.
"There are clamps restraining the landing strut of your ship and I'll need two good engineers to help me unlock them."
"I'll go Captain," Harry volunteered.
Janeway nodded. "Get Torres to go with you," Janeway ordered. They would have commed B'Elanna to tell her but one of the first things the Kazon had done when they had gained control of the ship was to take their commbadges. Without a word of acknowledgement Tom headed over to Ensign Kim.
"Where do we find Torres?" Tom asked the young Ensign.
"Main Engineering. I'll show you," Harry started but Tom stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
"I've got it," Tom said as he tapped a few buttons onto his wrist computer and they vanished in a shimmering swirl of blue particles. Janeway and Chakotay looked at each other briefly before helping secure the ship.
The pair materialized near the main entrance of engineering. The crew was scrambling around securing the ship's systems. Few people had noticed their appearance, as they were preoccupied with their tasks. "Torres," Tom yelled looking for the person who responded to the name. Many people looked over at him but he was generally ignored by the busy engineers.
"What do you want?" a half-klingon, half-human woman asked as she walked quickly over to them.
"Your help. Two of the four landing struts have been secured to the ground using clamps." He proceeded to list the tools they would need to undo them. Voyager's phasers were not precise enough to destroy the clamps without damaging the struts, and Mercury couldn't get a clear lock on the struts from its altitude. They would have to do this the old fashioned way.
After a minute they had acquired the tools they would need. "Mercury," he said into the microphone "transport to the following co- ordinates." He tapped a few buttons into the wrist computer and a moment later the trio vanished and reappeared on the surface of the planet. They were underneath Voyager in between the two forward landing struts. Tom tapped two more keys on his miniature computer and an instant later a few devices appeared at their feet.
Picking one up he showed them how they worked. "Place them this way on the joints of the clamps." He pressed on button and a click was heard. "That will lock it in place." He pressed a small red button. "Armed." He pressed a grey button. "Now it can't be removed disarmed and in ten second will erect a force-field unless the coded is inputted to disarm it." He quickly pressed a few buttons in sequence and another click was heard as the bomb was disarmed. He continued to give them a crash course on sabotaging the clamps and then sent the two to the left clamp while he went to the right.
Usually he would have own this on his own but there wasn't enough time. In the few times he had scouted the area he knew there were security patrols that came by every few minutes and there were random transmissions to Voyager from the ground center to inquire as to the status of the ship. Tom hoped they had decided to wait longer than usual to send a transmission but lady luck wasn't around tonight.
At the ops console the light blinked indicating that they were receiving a transmission. The officer at the console informed the Captain and after a few seconds was able to identify it as a transmission from the Kazon.
"Ignore it for now," Janeway ordered. They need more time to make their escape.
Underneath Voyager the three people were nearly finished with the restraints when a warning blinked on Tom's visor. Arming the last device he looked around trying to discern what had set off the warning. Information from the sensors was fed directly into the visor.
As he turned three circles enclosed around some slight motion a few kilometers away. It was too dark for Tom to see what exactly it was but as more information was displayed on the screen he knew what was coming. Another warning flashed on the screen and Tom turned his attention in another direction. Eight life-forms registered and were approaching quickly.
"Company," he said to himself and just then weapons fire sliced through the air near them. The three hid behind the struts shielding themselves. Tom glanced quickly around the side and fired a few shots hoping to take down some of the Kazon or at least slow them. He went behind the struts again and prepared for his run. He had to find out if they had completed sabotaging the restraints.
Tom started running towards Torres and Kim. He fired at the Kazon while he ran protecting himself as best he could. A few shots still hit their mark but Tom made it over to them. "Are you done?" He asked when he arrived next to them. Torres looked at Tom hoping he wasn't injured too badly.
"No, there are still two of them that need to be armed," she told him.
Tom pulled out two weapons and handed them to Harry and B'Elanna. "Cover me." He darted around to the other side of the ship where the unarmed explosives were located. His back was an open target for the Kazon but he had to do this. He armed one and then pressed the gray button and then armed the other and pressed the gray button on it as well. Mission complete but just as he was moving around to shield himself using the support he was hit twice once in the back and once in the leg.
The material of the suit on his back held against the weapon and only caused minor injury but where he was shot on the leg had already been weakened from an earlier blast that he had taken and the damage to his leg was more serious. Once he was safely to the other side he went back to work. Torres and Kim used the weapons they were given defend themselves against the attack.
"We need to get out of here," Harry said.
"I'm working on it." Tom's voice was calm and controlled. He had been in worse situations than this before. "Voyager, we need a beam out," Tom said as he tapped a button at the side of his headgear. There was no response and suddenly the large ship over them rocked slightly and the sound of an explosion rang in their ears. "Their go transporters."
Tom stopped pressing buttons on his computer and soon after the three found themselves inside another ship.
"Where-" Before Harry could finish the question Tom spoke.
"Welcome to Mercury. Don't touch anything, please." Harry and B'Elanna glanced at each other before looking back at Tom.
"Em, drop the cloak." Tom ordered and a moment later Mercury appeared on the sensors of Voyager and the Kazon. A few of the Kazon ships heading towards Voyager broke formation and started towards Mercury. With a few precisions shots Tom took out their weapons and engines.
"Captain, a ship just de-cloaked in low orbit," Chakotay informed her from the helm.
"Friend or foe?" she asked. On the sensors Chakotay watched as the ship fired on the Kazon vessels that engaged it.
"Friend."
Just then a low rumbling was felt throughout the ship. "What was that?" Janeway asked.
"Looks like explosives have just detonated on the landing struts," Ayala said from the tactical station.
"We're being hailed by the small ship," the ops officer said, "audio only."
"Captain, the restraints have been destroyed you should be able to take off now," Tom said over the commline.
"Understood." The commline closed. "Transport the Kazon off the ship and go to code blue," The captain ordered and the bridge was basked in blue light. A few moments later Ayala reported that all stations were at code blue status. The Maquis crewmembers were also familiar with Voyager's systems and much of the protocol and knew what they had to do in this situation.
The Mercury provided cover while Voyager started its ascent form the planet. Voyager was very vulnerable, as it could not manoeuvre very well during the beginning of its ascent. Tom piloted the Mercury and delivered damaging blows on the Kazon vessels. On sensors he saw that there were larger Kazon vessels approaching but Voyager would be out of orbit by the time they were here.
B'Elanna and Harry watched the sensors, checking on Voyager's status. The intrepid class vessel had made it out of the planets atmosphere but the Kazon vessels were in hot pursuit. Tom brought Mercury behind voyager shielding the ship as best he could from further damage. The shuttle vibrated as weapon's fire damaged the ship. Mercury's hull and shielding was holding up against the abuse but finally the shields failed and the ship lurched violently to one side.
"Torres, Kim stand by for transport," Tom said hurriedly.
"Corrin, life support is failing,' the ship announced just as the two Voyager crewmembers were transported from the ship.
"Em, you're back," Tom said absently as he punched commands in the main console.
"Much of my program had been damaged but three of eleven back up files have been r-re-re….'
"Restored," Tom finished. It would take him weeks to reprogram the computer to get Em back to the way it was before the displacement wave had hit.
'Life support is failing,' Em told him again.
"I know but I need to make sure they get out of here," he said again referring to Voyager and her crew.
"Captain the systems on the other ship are failing," the crewman and ops said. Just then Torres and Kim appeared on the bridge. After a momentary pause the went to their respective stations
"Ensign, does the ship have warp?" Janeway asked Harry.
"No, the core's unstable."
"Hail him,"
"He's responding, audio only." Harry routed the transmission to the bridge.
"Yes?" was the greeting. He was obviously busy trying to keep his ship together.
"Move your vessel closer and we'll look onto it with a tractor beam,"
"You can't," Tom plainly informed her. The planes of the hull were designed to reflect most tractor beams. Right now he didn't have the time to tell them how to make the modifications necessary for the tractor beam to work on his ship.
More alarms were heard from Tom's ship over the commline.
'Extensive damage –core breach imminent,' they heard the computer announce. Another direct hit further compromised the vessel causing explosions from many on the console in the ship including the central one where Tom was seated. Hearing the explosions Janeway called his name hoping to get some response but there was nothing.
'Emergency transport,' the computer on the Mercury announced and a moment later Tom materialised on Deck two of Voyager in the mess hall.
"He's on deck two," Harry announced. A chirp was heard as the transmission to the Mercury was ended by its computer but there was still an uplink between the two ships. Harry watched in confusion as several quads of encrypted information was transmitted to the Voyager's computer. The link was terminated when all the information was sent. Mercury turned around and headed toward the pursuing Kazon vessels.
If the ship was going to explode then it would take as many Kazon vessels with it as possible. Understanding what the ship was doing, Captain Janeway ordered Chakotay to take them to warp. They watched silently as the other ship exploded just before they went to warp. Voyager easily out ran the Kazon vessels and finally after nearly a month as the prisoners of the Kazon they were free.
On Deck two Tom was trying to get up when another pair of hands helped him up. The man was Talaxian and Tom thanked him for his help before walking out of the mess hall with a slight limp.
He made his way to the bridge. Stepping into the turbo lift he called out his destination and in the few seconds alone he took deep breaths trying to steady himself. The pain in his side and his leg were hard to ignore but his job wasn't done yet. This sector was crawling with Kazon vessels; some allied, others were not but all were looking to take Voyager as their prize. He would show them were to go and help them cover their tracks and then he'd leave.
Stepping off the turbolift he arrived on the bridge. The officers were busy with repairs and evading the Kazon. He walked down to the middle level where Captain Janeway stood still giving orders to her newly liberated crew.
"Are you alright?" she asked when she saw him. Tom nodded and went to the helm.
"Take this route." He indicted the path that was best. Chakotay looked at the man next to him. He had met him before but he couldn't quite remember from where.
Over the next several hours the crew worked on repairs while Tom helped them disguise their warp and ion trail so that the Kazon would not be able to track them easily. He worked alone, only occasionally going to ask were he could access certain systems.
The crew organized and it was quickly decided that they should be a Starfleet crew. There were no arguments voiced and in a matter of hours everybody on board other than Neelix, Kes and Tom had donned the Starfleet uniforms.
When Tom had completed his work he went to bridge to make sure the interface with the bridge systems was working. Voyager was still unfamiliar to him and he had to be sure he hadn't compromised any key systems with his tinkering. Everything seemed to be working in proper order when he arrived on the bridge. Well almost everything. Tom's body was at the end of its rope. He had been awake for over two days; surviving on mostly stimulants for the first hours but during the last day he hadn't taken any seeing as nearly everything he owned had been destroyed on Mercury.
He felt dizzy and tired but he forced himself to continue. They were still deep in Kazon space. He wouldn't let them get caught now that they were finally free. There was no way he'd could do this all again, and without the aid of Mercury.
"Corrin," he heard somebody address him and he looked over. Had he been thinking properly he would have realized he shouldn't have responded to that name. He didn't want these people to know either of his surnames just yet. Not until he knew how much they were aware of. But unfortunately for him his mind was a little sluggish and he faced the person who had addressed him, Chakotay. Chakotay had remembered where he knew Tom from and recalled the name that Sobey had used to address him. He had called the name to see if Tom would respond and he had.
"Are you alright?" Chakotay asked. Tom started to nod his head but stopped when a dizzy spell hit him. Holding onto the railing he stayed on his feet. Chakotay looked at the young man and noted his condition, his fair skin was too pale and there was a think film of perspiration on the man forehead. He must be injured, Chakotay thought.
"I'm….fine," Tom lied. He closed his eyes and tried to force his dizzy spell to pass. Instead it only worsened and with his concentration broken he could no longer block the pain from his injuries, old an new.
He didn't realize he had started to collapse until he felt Chakotay's arms helping him keep his balance. "You need to go Sickbay."
"I'm okay. I have to finish…"
"You can finish it later." Tom turned his head and saw Janeway coming over to them. Chakotay removed his arms from around Tom when he had regained his balance. Chakotay felt wetness on his fingers and looked at his hand. Blood, the side of his suit was soaked in it.
"You need to go to sickbay," Chakotay stated looking at Tom. There had to be quite a bit of bleed for it to cover his had so much and it must have been quite a blast to damage the durable material of Tom's attire, who knows what other wound was being concealed.
"Ensign, lock onto Tom and transport him to Sickbay," The captain instructed. Harry nodded.
"Chakotay," Chakotay looked into Tom's eyes. "Sobey didn't make it, did he?" it sounded more like a statement but Chakotay nodded the affirmative. Tom looked down. He had waited too long. He was too late. He hadn't done enough.
Chakotay didn't know how close Tom and Sobey were but he could tell that Tom was blaming himself for something. "He didn't survive the trip to the Delta Quadrant," Chakotay said hoping to alleviate some of the guilt Tom was feeling, though he didn't understand the cause of it.
Tom looked up into the dark eyes of the new first officer and looked away. "I failed him," he said quietly just before he vanished in a transporter beam.
((=/\=))
End Part 4
Leave a review please! :) Thanks! zappyzaps@hotmail.com
Author: Zappy Zaps
Category: AU Drama/Action/Adventure
Summary: Neh….
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: All the Star Trek characters are Paramount's. I don't own them (yet). ;)
Archiving: Please do, but tell me! zappyzaps@hotmail.com
Author's note: The conclusion to what happened during the escape. And now back to my favourite genre! Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe!! Mwa-ha ha ha haaa!! (
May 02
Part 4
Carefully he wove through the corridors of the ship. A small light on the screen in his visor blinked green indicating that the woman had placed his gadget in the right place and it was active. He knew all the crewmembers were in the cargo bays. He had hacked his way into Voyager's computer from Mercury and had made and internal sensor sweep. Only the woman he had helped had been out of the cargo bays.
He was heading to the bridge now. From there he could control just about anything. He had contemplated going to main engineering but after seeing the lay out he had determined that there were too many points of entry for him to block off before reinforcements came so he chose the bridge instead.
While he was in the turbolift he contacted Mercury and instructed the computer to upload the virus he created. Another green light flashed indicating that the deed had been done.
On the bridge of Voyager the Kazon looked over the systems in the ship and ran diagnostics as they familiarized themselves with Voyager's systems. Maj Cullah and Jabin were in the Captain's Ready Room discussing the fate of their prisoners when for no apparent reason the lights went out. Jabin and Cullah immediately went for the exit but found they were all locked down.
On the bridge the other Kazon were confused. The only lighting was provided by the buttons on the consoles. As they stumbled around blindly they were unaware of the extra being on the bridge who was taking them out one by one, silently.
With the night vision on his visor he could easily see the Kazon forms as the moved in the darkness. With expert ease and efficiency he took down each one, sometimes using as little as a Vulcan neck pinch.
A minute later the lights came back on as Voyager's computer system corrected the error and functions were returned to normal, almost. The bridge remained locked down and only Tom could unlock them. The minute of darkness had been more than enough for him to gain control of the bridge. Moving to the operations console he transported the unconscious Kazon officers to the brig and erected a force-field to keep them there.
He had to get the Kazon off of Voyager or at least in a place where they can be easily managed. The brig wouldn't be able to hold all of them. If he beamed them outside to the planet they'd inform the others that something was occurring on Voyager and would bring back up.
Tom settled for relocating as many as he could to the brig and transporting the rest of them to the mess hall. It wasn't the most secure of locations but hopefully it would hold them long enough for the Starfleet officers to be reorganized and able to contain the Kazon.
Due to some damages the capacity of the transporters was limited and he could only transport eight people at a time using each transporter system. The Kazon that were still on the loose were a hazard but Tom doubted they would be able to hamper his plans too much. His main concern had been that they would go after the Voyager crew that was locked in the cargo bays.
The device he had given the woman to place on the door controls had locked down all entrances and exited to the cargo bays and erected force- fields to repel weapons fire should any Kazon try to go after the crew.
A few minutes later all transports had been completed. Tom sent an encrypted command to the device at the cargo bay and it ceased functioning, unlocking the doors and terminating the force-field.
In the cargo bay the crew was lost in the dark bumping into each other and any other object in the large rooms. At the entrances crewmembers worked to try an open the doors. Jennifer Delaney had told them everything she knew about the stranger but nobody knew his identity.
The lights came on again and they all wondered what was going on. Torres and Kim continued their work on opening the door along with Carey but they hadn't made any progress. Unexpectedly, the doors slid open allowing them to exit the room. Captain Janeway looked at the three people who had been working on opening the door.
"Good work," she commended them. Torres, Kim and Carey looked at one another in confusion.
"We didn't do anything," Carey said.
They all came to the conclusion that it was their mysterious stranger who had released them. Each person exited the cargo bay heading to their respective positions. They were going to assume that there were still armed Kazon on board. Torres and Carey went to main engineering while Kim, Chakotay, Tuvok, Janeway and a few other bridge officers went to the bridge.
They arrived on the bridge and saw the man matching Ensign Delaney's description standing as he tapped some commands into the helm console. He wore a dark grey suit with pockets in many places and the knees and elbows of the suit had extra padding on it. The material looked fairly thick but did not hamper his movement t at all. He also had on gloves. The palms had a thin material to protect his hands but not reduce his sense of touch while the backside of the gloves were thicker.
Knowing that Janeway and her crew would come to the bridge Tom had unlocked the exit before their arrival. When he finished entering the string of commands he turned to face the newcomers.
He looked at each of them and they scrutinized him as well. His gaze rested on the Captain. "Captain Janeway, I presume."
"Yes. And you are?"
"Tom," was the simple reply. "Approximately sixty-five Kazon are locked in the mess hall and the brig. Security team should be sent to each location. If any doors or systems are locked down the words 'Gamma phi' will open them up."
"Tuvok," Janeway looked at her friend and he nodded to her unspoken order and headed for the trubolift.
"There are clamps restraining the landing strut of your ship and I'll need two good engineers to help me unlock them."
"I'll go Captain," Harry volunteered.
Janeway nodded. "Get Torres to go with you," Janeway ordered. They would have commed B'Elanna to tell her but one of the first things the Kazon had done when they had gained control of the ship was to take their commbadges. Without a word of acknowledgement Tom headed over to Ensign Kim.
"Where do we find Torres?" Tom asked the young Ensign.
"Main Engineering. I'll show you," Harry started but Tom stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
"I've got it," Tom said as he tapped a few buttons onto his wrist computer and they vanished in a shimmering swirl of blue particles. Janeway and Chakotay looked at each other briefly before helping secure the ship.
The pair materialized near the main entrance of engineering. The crew was scrambling around securing the ship's systems. Few people had noticed their appearance, as they were preoccupied with their tasks. "Torres," Tom yelled looking for the person who responded to the name. Many people looked over at him but he was generally ignored by the busy engineers.
"What do you want?" a half-klingon, half-human woman asked as she walked quickly over to them.
"Your help. Two of the four landing struts have been secured to the ground using clamps." He proceeded to list the tools they would need to undo them. Voyager's phasers were not precise enough to destroy the clamps without damaging the struts, and Mercury couldn't get a clear lock on the struts from its altitude. They would have to do this the old fashioned way.
After a minute they had acquired the tools they would need. "Mercury," he said into the microphone "transport to the following co- ordinates." He tapped a few buttons into the wrist computer and a moment later the trio vanished and reappeared on the surface of the planet. They were underneath Voyager in between the two forward landing struts. Tom tapped two more keys on his miniature computer and an instant later a few devices appeared at their feet.
Picking one up he showed them how they worked. "Place them this way on the joints of the clamps." He pressed on button and a click was heard. "That will lock it in place." He pressed a small red button. "Armed." He pressed a grey button. "Now it can't be removed disarmed and in ten second will erect a force-field unless the coded is inputted to disarm it." He quickly pressed a few buttons in sequence and another click was heard as the bomb was disarmed. He continued to give them a crash course on sabotaging the clamps and then sent the two to the left clamp while he went to the right.
Usually he would have own this on his own but there wasn't enough time. In the few times he had scouted the area he knew there were security patrols that came by every few minutes and there were random transmissions to Voyager from the ground center to inquire as to the status of the ship. Tom hoped they had decided to wait longer than usual to send a transmission but lady luck wasn't around tonight.
At the ops console the light blinked indicating that they were receiving a transmission. The officer at the console informed the Captain and after a few seconds was able to identify it as a transmission from the Kazon.
"Ignore it for now," Janeway ordered. They need more time to make their escape.
Underneath Voyager the three people were nearly finished with the restraints when a warning blinked on Tom's visor. Arming the last device he looked around trying to discern what had set off the warning. Information from the sensors was fed directly into the visor.
As he turned three circles enclosed around some slight motion a few kilometers away. It was too dark for Tom to see what exactly it was but as more information was displayed on the screen he knew what was coming. Another warning flashed on the screen and Tom turned his attention in another direction. Eight life-forms registered and were approaching quickly.
"Company," he said to himself and just then weapons fire sliced through the air near them. The three hid behind the struts shielding themselves. Tom glanced quickly around the side and fired a few shots hoping to take down some of the Kazon or at least slow them. He went behind the struts again and prepared for his run. He had to find out if they had completed sabotaging the restraints.
Tom started running towards Torres and Kim. He fired at the Kazon while he ran protecting himself as best he could. A few shots still hit their mark but Tom made it over to them. "Are you done?" He asked when he arrived next to them. Torres looked at Tom hoping he wasn't injured too badly.
"No, there are still two of them that need to be armed," she told him.
Tom pulled out two weapons and handed them to Harry and B'Elanna. "Cover me." He darted around to the other side of the ship where the unarmed explosives were located. His back was an open target for the Kazon but he had to do this. He armed one and then pressed the gray button and then armed the other and pressed the gray button on it as well. Mission complete but just as he was moving around to shield himself using the support he was hit twice once in the back and once in the leg.
The material of the suit on his back held against the weapon and only caused minor injury but where he was shot on the leg had already been weakened from an earlier blast that he had taken and the damage to his leg was more serious. Once he was safely to the other side he went back to work. Torres and Kim used the weapons they were given defend themselves against the attack.
"We need to get out of here," Harry said.
"I'm working on it." Tom's voice was calm and controlled. He had been in worse situations than this before. "Voyager, we need a beam out," Tom said as he tapped a button at the side of his headgear. There was no response and suddenly the large ship over them rocked slightly and the sound of an explosion rang in their ears. "Their go transporters."
Tom stopped pressing buttons on his computer and soon after the three found themselves inside another ship.
"Where-" Before Harry could finish the question Tom spoke.
"Welcome to Mercury. Don't touch anything, please." Harry and B'Elanna glanced at each other before looking back at Tom.
"Em, drop the cloak." Tom ordered and a moment later Mercury appeared on the sensors of Voyager and the Kazon. A few of the Kazon ships heading towards Voyager broke formation and started towards Mercury. With a few precisions shots Tom took out their weapons and engines.
"Captain, a ship just de-cloaked in low orbit," Chakotay informed her from the helm.
"Friend or foe?" she asked. On the sensors Chakotay watched as the ship fired on the Kazon vessels that engaged it.
"Friend."
Just then a low rumbling was felt throughout the ship. "What was that?" Janeway asked.
"Looks like explosives have just detonated on the landing struts," Ayala said from the tactical station.
"We're being hailed by the small ship," the ops officer said, "audio only."
"Captain, the restraints have been destroyed you should be able to take off now," Tom said over the commline.
"Understood." The commline closed. "Transport the Kazon off the ship and go to code blue," The captain ordered and the bridge was basked in blue light. A few moments later Ayala reported that all stations were at code blue status. The Maquis crewmembers were also familiar with Voyager's systems and much of the protocol and knew what they had to do in this situation.
The Mercury provided cover while Voyager started its ascent form the planet. Voyager was very vulnerable, as it could not manoeuvre very well during the beginning of its ascent. Tom piloted the Mercury and delivered damaging blows on the Kazon vessels. On sensors he saw that there were larger Kazon vessels approaching but Voyager would be out of orbit by the time they were here.
B'Elanna and Harry watched the sensors, checking on Voyager's status. The intrepid class vessel had made it out of the planets atmosphere but the Kazon vessels were in hot pursuit. Tom brought Mercury behind voyager shielding the ship as best he could from further damage. The shuttle vibrated as weapon's fire damaged the ship. Mercury's hull and shielding was holding up against the abuse but finally the shields failed and the ship lurched violently to one side.
"Torres, Kim stand by for transport," Tom said hurriedly.
"Corrin, life support is failing,' the ship announced just as the two Voyager crewmembers were transported from the ship.
"Em, you're back," Tom said absently as he punched commands in the main console.
"Much of my program had been damaged but three of eleven back up files have been r-re-re….'
"Restored," Tom finished. It would take him weeks to reprogram the computer to get Em back to the way it was before the displacement wave had hit.
'Life support is failing,' Em told him again.
"I know but I need to make sure they get out of here," he said again referring to Voyager and her crew.
"Captain the systems on the other ship are failing," the crewman and ops said. Just then Torres and Kim appeared on the bridge. After a momentary pause the went to their respective stations
"Ensign, does the ship have warp?" Janeway asked Harry.
"No, the core's unstable."
"Hail him,"
"He's responding, audio only." Harry routed the transmission to the bridge.
"Yes?" was the greeting. He was obviously busy trying to keep his ship together.
"Move your vessel closer and we'll look onto it with a tractor beam,"
"You can't," Tom plainly informed her. The planes of the hull were designed to reflect most tractor beams. Right now he didn't have the time to tell them how to make the modifications necessary for the tractor beam to work on his ship.
More alarms were heard from Tom's ship over the commline.
'Extensive damage –core breach imminent,' they heard the computer announce. Another direct hit further compromised the vessel causing explosions from many on the console in the ship including the central one where Tom was seated. Hearing the explosions Janeway called his name hoping to get some response but there was nothing.
'Emergency transport,' the computer on the Mercury announced and a moment later Tom materialised on Deck two of Voyager in the mess hall.
"He's on deck two," Harry announced. A chirp was heard as the transmission to the Mercury was ended by its computer but there was still an uplink between the two ships. Harry watched in confusion as several quads of encrypted information was transmitted to the Voyager's computer. The link was terminated when all the information was sent. Mercury turned around and headed toward the pursuing Kazon vessels.
If the ship was going to explode then it would take as many Kazon vessels with it as possible. Understanding what the ship was doing, Captain Janeway ordered Chakotay to take them to warp. They watched silently as the other ship exploded just before they went to warp. Voyager easily out ran the Kazon vessels and finally after nearly a month as the prisoners of the Kazon they were free.
On Deck two Tom was trying to get up when another pair of hands helped him up. The man was Talaxian and Tom thanked him for his help before walking out of the mess hall with a slight limp.
He made his way to the bridge. Stepping into the turbo lift he called out his destination and in the few seconds alone he took deep breaths trying to steady himself. The pain in his side and his leg were hard to ignore but his job wasn't done yet. This sector was crawling with Kazon vessels; some allied, others were not but all were looking to take Voyager as their prize. He would show them were to go and help them cover their tracks and then he'd leave.
Stepping off the turbolift he arrived on the bridge. The officers were busy with repairs and evading the Kazon. He walked down to the middle level where Captain Janeway stood still giving orders to her newly liberated crew.
"Are you alright?" she asked when she saw him. Tom nodded and went to the helm.
"Take this route." He indicted the path that was best. Chakotay looked at the man next to him. He had met him before but he couldn't quite remember from where.
Over the next several hours the crew worked on repairs while Tom helped them disguise their warp and ion trail so that the Kazon would not be able to track them easily. He worked alone, only occasionally going to ask were he could access certain systems.
The crew organized and it was quickly decided that they should be a Starfleet crew. There were no arguments voiced and in a matter of hours everybody on board other than Neelix, Kes and Tom had donned the Starfleet uniforms.
When Tom had completed his work he went to bridge to make sure the interface with the bridge systems was working. Voyager was still unfamiliar to him and he had to be sure he hadn't compromised any key systems with his tinkering. Everything seemed to be working in proper order when he arrived on the bridge. Well almost everything. Tom's body was at the end of its rope. He had been awake for over two days; surviving on mostly stimulants for the first hours but during the last day he hadn't taken any seeing as nearly everything he owned had been destroyed on Mercury.
He felt dizzy and tired but he forced himself to continue. They were still deep in Kazon space. He wouldn't let them get caught now that they were finally free. There was no way he'd could do this all again, and without the aid of Mercury.
"Corrin," he heard somebody address him and he looked over. Had he been thinking properly he would have realized he shouldn't have responded to that name. He didn't want these people to know either of his surnames just yet. Not until he knew how much they were aware of. But unfortunately for him his mind was a little sluggish and he faced the person who had addressed him, Chakotay. Chakotay had remembered where he knew Tom from and recalled the name that Sobey had used to address him. He had called the name to see if Tom would respond and he had.
"Are you alright?" Chakotay asked. Tom started to nod his head but stopped when a dizzy spell hit him. Holding onto the railing he stayed on his feet. Chakotay looked at the young man and noted his condition, his fair skin was too pale and there was a think film of perspiration on the man forehead. He must be injured, Chakotay thought.
"I'm….fine," Tom lied. He closed his eyes and tried to force his dizzy spell to pass. Instead it only worsened and with his concentration broken he could no longer block the pain from his injuries, old an new.
He didn't realize he had started to collapse until he felt Chakotay's arms helping him keep his balance. "You need to go Sickbay."
"I'm okay. I have to finish…"
"You can finish it later." Tom turned his head and saw Janeway coming over to them. Chakotay removed his arms from around Tom when he had regained his balance. Chakotay felt wetness on his fingers and looked at his hand. Blood, the side of his suit was soaked in it.
"You need to go to sickbay," Chakotay stated looking at Tom. There had to be quite a bit of bleed for it to cover his had so much and it must have been quite a blast to damage the durable material of Tom's attire, who knows what other wound was being concealed.
"Ensign, lock onto Tom and transport him to Sickbay," The captain instructed. Harry nodded.
"Chakotay," Chakotay looked into Tom's eyes. "Sobey didn't make it, did he?" it sounded more like a statement but Chakotay nodded the affirmative. Tom looked down. He had waited too long. He was too late. He hadn't done enough.
Chakotay didn't know how close Tom and Sobey were but he could tell that Tom was blaming himself for something. "He didn't survive the trip to the Delta Quadrant," Chakotay said hoping to alleviate some of the guilt Tom was feeling, though he didn't understand the cause of it.
Tom looked up into the dark eyes of the new first officer and looked away. "I failed him," he said quietly just before he vanished in a transporter beam.
((=/\=))
End Part 4
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